Despite having his state of the Commonwealth address delayed by a snowstorm, Governor Deval Patrick was required to release his budget proposal this past Wednesday to officially kick off budget deliberations for fiscal year 2015.
A huge win for elder home care services came in line items that support the Aging Service Access Points and state Home Care Program, which received an additional $16.9 million, according to Executive Office of Elder Affairs Secretary Ann Hartstein. 
Among those funds are increases of $9.8 million for the Enhanced Community Options Program (ECOP) and $7.5 million for the “basic” category of services.
Combined, according to Secretary Hartstein, those two line item increases will eliminate waiting lists through the end of fiscal year 2015. The funding boost works out to an additional hour of homemaking services per consumer per month on average, but Secretary Hartstein stressed that, in reality, the money would pay for whatever services people may need when they need them.
The Governor also put a $1.3 million increase to the Senior Supportive Housing account, which will expand “assisted living facility-type services” for seniors in public housing. Specifically, the money will add another 10 public housing sites where senior residents will be supported by home care services.
Another $1.2 million was added in a new line item titled “Home Care Workforce Training Fund.” This new account will support workforce training for Aging Service Access Points, although the administration is not yet clear on which workers will receive training. Case management, protective services and direct care workers are all on the table as potential recipients.
MassHealth experienced major changes in the budget, mostly related to federal healthcare reform. Since the MassHealth Basic and Essential programs were eliminated, a combined $706.3 million is now in populations with expanded coverage and in the new MassHealth plans. The MassHealth Senior Care account was granted another $271.4 million by the Governor and the MassHealth Managed Care account saw an additional $336.7 million. The MassHealth Fee-for-Service line item was raised by $205 million. It is unclear how these increases might result in better reimbursement rates for home health agencies. A formal rate reassessment hearing is still being eagerly awaited.
Other items of note from the Governor’s budget include the following:
- Applying the state sales tax to candy and soda. The administration estimates that would raise roughly $57 million for health promotion and prevention programs.
- The Governor’s budget cuts the MassHealth Nursing Home Supplimental Rates by $20.7 million
- Pediatric Palliative Care is essentially level funded at just over $1.5 million
- The Governor’s budget includes a special fund for federal assistance (FMAP) relative to health reform and healthcare access expansion called the Health Insurance Expansion Fund.
- The DPH budget gets an overall increase of 1% with details in Commissioner Cheryl Bartlett’s “Mass Public Health” blog post.
Stay tuned for more budget-related news and advocacy alerts.
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